Solar Farms to be Built in Tully, N.Y.

This summer, ClearPath Energy plans to begin building three solar farms on 100 acres of farmland near Tully, N.Y. Each of these solar farms will be twice the size of the largest solar farms currently built in Onondaga County, producing a total output of 15 megawatts combined. These solar farms would be a massive development in New York’s fight against climate change by increasing the county’s solar capacity by 50%. This increase would allow Onondaga County to cover the usage of roughly 2,200 average homes with solar energy alone. The company founder, Greg Hering, has hopes to build the three solar farms during the summer and fall of 2021 and connect them to the power grid by the end of the year. The energy from these farms will be sold from the farms directly to residential or small commercial customers. These customers will receive credit on their National Grid bill for the energy purchased from ClearPath.

These solar farms are just the beginning of what state energy officials hope to build in Central New York. As of right now, there are 29 potential solar projects that are being looked at within Onondaga County that have the potential to produce 190 megawatts of power combined. There is also a large pipeline of proposed solar projects that are subsidized with state money that would out scale even the largest of the solar farms coming to Tully. In northern Cayuga County a Florida company is attempting to get approval for a 200 megawatt solar farm, while in the southern portion of the same county a Texas company is planning to build a second 200 megawatt solar farm. Genesee County currently has the largest proposed solar farm in New York State, potentially producing 500 megawatts of power. This project would require leasing land from 31 different property owners within a seven square mile radius.

Although there are a large number of projects planned within the state of New York, only a select handful of them actually get built each year. This is largely due to the process of gaining financing and regulatory approval which can take years to do. The hardest approval to get is the authorization to connect to the electric grid. This step alone usually takes three years and requires multiple studies.

The COVID-19 pandemic has also caused hurdles in terms of New York switching to solar power. The pandemic has increased the cost of ocean shipping seven-fold, making it financially difficult to obtain the supplies needed for these projects as many solar panels are produced in Asia. However, this setback has not stopped New York State’s motivation in adopting renewable energy. The State is still committed to its renewable energy goals set in the Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act signed in 2019. This Act requires a 40% reduction in greenhouse gases by 2030, and New York officials have responded by instilling a target of 70% state energy production coming from renewable sources by 2030. These new projects being planned will help get New York State on track to hit this goal by the next decade, as long as local support allows it to happen.  Support the transition to clean energy by paying close attention to the proposed solar and wind projects in your area and make your preferences known to your local elected officials.  The sooner these installations can come online, the smaller our carbon footprint will be.

News Bites

More needed: G7 nations agree to boost climate finance

Source: Reuters

https://www.reuters.com/business/sustainable-business/g7-leaders-commit-increasing-climate-finance-contributions-2021-06-12/

The seven nations—The US, the UK, Canada, France, Germany, Italy and Japan—agreed to “jointly mobilize $100 billion per year from public and private sources, through to 2025” but the final communique was short on detail.  The leaders were criticized by the Climate Action Network for failing to agree on concrete commitments on climate finance.

Experiment evaluates the effect of human decisions on climate reconstructions

Source: Cambridge University

https://www.cam.ac.uk/research/news/experiment-evaluates-the-effect-of-human-decisions-on-climate-reconstructions

In a fascinating double-blind study, multiple research groups were given the same tree ring data and asked to create a model of the Earth’s temperature changes over the past 2000 years.  While none of the results contradicted each other, their differences highlighted how decision-making can affect the outcomes of scientific research.

The Keystone XL Pipeline Has Officially Been Canceled After Opposition From Biden Administration

Source: TIME USA

https://time.com/6072591/keystone-xl-pipeline-canceled/

After sixteen years of development and protests, TC Energy has finally pulled the plug on the Keystone XL oil pipeline that would have transported 800,000 barrels a day from the Canadian tar sands in Alberta to Steele City in Nebraska.  350.org founder Bill McKibben commented, “When enough people rise up, we’re stronger even than the richest fossil fuel companies.”

SPOTLIGHT ON ROSEANN & GEORGE LOREFICE
By George Lorefice

Roseann and George Lorefice are residents of Manlius, NY and have been married for 48 years. They have two sons who live on the West Coast, one married with a 2½ year old toddler. Roseann is a French teacher, having retired from Chittenango High School in 2005. She continued to teach at Ithaca College and SUNY Cortland for a few years, and remains very active in foreign language associations, editing newsletters and working on web sites. George retired from Bristol Myers Squibb in 2004 as Director, Corporate Quality and Good Manufacturing Practices, after 24 years.  After consulting for six more years, he retired to his garden and workshop. Until the pandemic, they both spent as much time as possible at their cabin in Canada, and traveled actively within the US, Europe, Central and South America.

Roseann and George have been active members of CCAA for several years. Roseann first became involved when she volunteered to work on the CNY People’s Climate March that took place in April 2017. Although Roseann has been more involved in CCAA, George has been there for support. Both have always had the environment foremost in their minds. As a former limnologist—an expert in freshwater ponds and lakes—George keeps up with current environmental matters, and climate change in particular. Participating in CCAA meetings and activities has kept them abreast of the consequences of climate change and also the efforts being made to curb the earth’s temperature rise due to human carbon emissions.

Over the years with CCAA, one of the highlights was the fundraiser Make America Magnifique Again with its French theme. Roseann spearheaded a recent project that produced the Climate Survey which was delivered to local political candidates and posted on CCAA’s website. They also took CCAA’s CNY Carbon Challenge. The Challenge is a positive approach to understanding and reducing your carbon footprint. Guided by clear questions, you measure your carbon emissions and are provided practical ways to bring them down.

Looking for other ways to slow down and stop the rise in carbon emissions, George became interested in Project Drawdown. The project is a positive approach to climate change by highlighting solutions that are already available to begin to solve the crisis. He likes the ideas set forth in the Project because it recognizes that climate change is already here and focuses on solutions rather than doom and gloom messaging.

George and Roseann actively practice what they preach in their 145-year-old house. They switched to a heat pump with a more efficient back-up gas furnace and hot water heater, replaced old windows with double-pane windows and added more insulation. Choosing not to invest in solar panels, they subscribe to Community Solar, thereby avoiding the capital expense but benefiting from solar power with the added advantage of a 10% discount on their electric bill.  Last year, the National Solar Tour featured a video in which George described his experience with Community Solar.  They have one gas vehicle and one hybrid, with plans to replace the gas vehicle with a hybrid and the hybrid with an all-electric vehicle. Although they would like to do more to reduce their carbon footprint, practicality and expense must be considered as well.

As CCAA looks to the future, Roseann and George hope to participate where they can, but more importantly continue to be spokespeople for lowering mankind’s carbon footprint and reducing their own as an example.